**Public Sector Apprenticeship Target**

Blaby District Council is required to publish information demonstrating progress in meeting the Public Sector Apprenticeship Target.

This data covers the period between 1st April 2019 and 31st March 2020.

| Number of employees who were working in England for Blaby District Council on 31 March 2019 | 319 | | Number of employees who were working in England for Blaby District Council on 31 March 2020 | 331 | | Number of new employees who started working for Blaby District Council in England between 1 April 2019 to 31 March 2020 | 48 | | Number of apprentices who were working in England on 31 March 2019 | 9 | | Number of apprentices who were working in England on 31 March 2020 | 6 | | Number of new apprentices in England between 1 April 2019 to 31 March 2020 (includes both new hires and existing employees who started an apprenticeship) | 5 | | Percentage of apprenticeship starts (both new hires and existing employees who started an apprenticeship) as a proportion of employment starts between 1 April 2019 to 31 March 2020 | 10.4 | | Percentage of total headcount that were apprentices on 31 March 2020 | 1.81 | | Percentage of apprenticeship starts (both new hires and existing employees who started an apprenticeship) between 1 April 2019 to 31 March 2020 as a proportion of total headcount on 31 March 2019 | 1.56 |

Blaby District Council continued to encourage managers to look at opportunities for apprentices while recruiting. During this timeframe, we began higher level apprentice qualifications to fill skill shortages in exiting teams and as development for existing staff.

We pride ourselves on our low drop out rate and always want to ensure our apprentices have a high level of support and are carefully considered to ensure the quality of opportunities. Managers of smaller teams want to ensure any apprentice gels well with the team they are to work in and are aware of the positive impact in finding a good fit can have for the apprentice’s and wider team’s experience.

Our main challenge in this period was from our service areas where most were engaging in a high level of support for their existing apprentices and therefore were hesitant to dilute that attention with further recruitment of new employees. We also focused on offering development to existing employees including two former apprentices who secured a permanent role and went on to study for the next level apprenticeship.

The Covid 19 pandemic has changed the way we work at the Council and therefore has resulted in unprecedented times for our current service areas. We will continue to promote higher level apprenticeships for existing staff as there is already established support in place. We will also continue to support entry level apprenticeships and explore how we can do this as the Council moves to a more permanent remote working strategy.

Working with other organisations that are moving in the same direction to share best practise in supporting Apprenticeships would be really beneficial and we would welcome any support and guidance with this.

At the time of writing we have an apprenticeship due to go out to advert with a great opportunity for someone who wants to combine practical training with studying towards and apprenticeship qualification, with discussion under way for a second.